3-Year Shutdown of Overpasses for Road Work Is Far Too Long

Egads! Caltrans is such an easy target for abuse and scorn. The latest episode in its long history of poor planning and general incompetence is the announcement of the closing of the overpasses linking Tustin and Santa Ana on 4th and 1st streets for a total of almost three years.

In order to widen the freeways and relocate some ramps, Caltrans is going to exacerbate what is already a disastrously congested traffic pattern for an unconscionable period of time. Traffic will be diverted to 17th Street, which is plenty congested now, or to 1st Street while the work takes place on 4th Street.

There’s no way to get on the southbound Costa Mesa Freeway from 1st Street. That means that all vehicles will head either for 17th Street or fight their way down to McFadden Avenue on crowded surface streets. “All vehicles” includes the dozens of hot-rodding cowboys in sand and gravel trucks who have been terrorizing drivers on Irvine Boulevard.

Meanwhile, the clowns on the Tustin and Santa Ana city councils are too busy with their intramural bickering to say to Caltrans: “Wait a minute? Why is it going to take this long to build three overpasses, some ramps and do some grading?”

Remember, during World War II, the Burma Road was carved out of the jungle by hand in less than a year. The Alcan Highway took a year to build. Maybe we should hire the Army Corps of Engineers to do the job. I’d wager they could get the whole job done in 60 days.

CLINT HOPSON

Santa Ana